28 February 2011

Sparta? Been there, done that. On to the Crimea!

In honor of Blawg Review's 300th edition, the still-anonymous-after-all-these-years Editor hearkened-back to the legendary three hundred Spartans who held the pass at Thermopylae. That Blawg Review 300 are indeed a select group — and one I'm pleased to be part of not once but six times (five all by my lonesome and once as co-author with my good friend Mike Semple Piggot).

Three hundred is an undeniable achievement, particularly in the blogging medium, where histories, memories, and lifespans are typically short. The Editor is generous in his praise for the many who have hosted Blawg Review over the past five-plus years; he reserves none of the laurels for himself, which is his way. Still, any commemoration of a milestone like this one would be hollow if we did not take a moment to salute Ed. and the institution he's built for the legal blogging community as a whole. I'll look forward to congratulating him in person this Saturday when he comes to San Francisco to meet-up with local legal bloggers and to announce the Blawg Review of the Year Award.

So this is three hundred down and who knows how many yet to come. I'm looking forward to that day many years from now when we'll honor not the first three hundred but the first six hundred. When we reach that milestone, we'll have made it all the way from Sparta to the Crimea, site of the cavalry charge immortalized by Tennyson:

Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
'Forward, the Light Brigade!
Charge for the guns' he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

Mirriam Seddiq will lead the charge next Monday, when she hosts Blawg Review #301 at her Not Guilty blog.

Unsilent Partners

About Me

I am presently corporate counsel for Accela, Inc., a software company headquartered in San Ramon, California and am a member of both the Oregon and California State Bars. More detailed professional information is available at my LinkedIn profile.

I have been blogging at Infamy or Praise since early 2005. From 2006 to 2009, I served as a "Sherpa" at Blawg Review, the weekly carnival of legal blogging; I have also hosted (or co-hosted) six editions of Blawg Review, the first four of which were awarded a "Blawg Review of the Year" award. I formerly was a co-blogger at Unsilent Partners. I'm on Twitter as "colinsamuels".

I am the author of "Humanizing the Profession: Lawyers Find Their Public Voices Through Blogging" (11 Nexus L. J. 89 (2006)) and a contributing author to "Blogging and Other Social Media" (Gower Publishing Limited, 2008) and "Legal Profession: Modern Approach" (The Icfai University Press, 2008).

None of the foregoing blogging, tweeting, or personal writing necessarily represents the views of my employer; responsibility for these is entirely mine.